I can't think of a title, but this one is about meat...

I have been accused of hypocrisy because, with all my Liberal philosophizing, I am still a carnivore. Guilty as charged, and apologetically so.

Every once in a while, I get in an argument with someone irrevocably convinced that they are so right that any argument against them, no mater how logical, must immediately fall before their superior intellect and anyone who would make such an argument must be evil incarnate. And sometimes I get accused of the same thing. It’s a situation where neither party is ever going to convince the other, and the best that I can hope for is that I’ll get an article out of it.

The other day I was in a “discussion” (you might call it an argument; I’d call it a fight) over my refusal to embrace a Vegan lifestyle. In this person’s eye, being a Vegetarian was only a short step from being a carnivore, and a carnivore was only marginally superior to a cannibal. The Vegan path was the One True Way.

I should have realized that it’s pointless to debate with a True Believer (in anything) but sometimes I can’t help myself. Predictably, the argument went nowhere for either of us and I have resorted to my blog to make the arguments that this person was entirely disinclined to entertain.

I’m not going to waste any time on the whole Vegetarian vs. Vegan debate; I don’t have a dog in that fight. I am as nature has made me…an Omnivore. Which occasionally means being a carnivore.

I take note of the fact that there are many animals on this Earth that would happily eat me without any moral qualm, and no one would accuse them of any immorality in doing so. Against such an argument is always brought forth the argument that we, as Human Beings, are above all that; as if we were, by virtue of our virtue, above the crass behavior of lesser beasts.

I consider such species-specific elitism to be pure nonsense and unsupportable by logic or reason. It’s a philosophical argument and accepting it requires accepting the philosophy behind it. I don’t.

Nor do I give much credence to the old argument that if I were to see how animals were slaughtered, I would never eat meat again. Leaving aside the fact that many of the hunters I have known do their own butchering as well as killing, I myself have helped butcher cattle and felt no revulsion at the practice. It wasn’t pleasant by any means, but I never had the sense that what I was doing was somehow evil or unnatural.

(I do acknowledge that many commercial slaughterhouses are indeed hellholes. I attribute this to the greed of those who control industrial meet processing, and this is a better argument against human avarice than against the butcher’s trade.)

Neither am I likely to be persuaded by arguments as to the “humanity” of animals, or their “cuteness.” Yes, cats are cute when they’re housecat-sized; when they’re bigger than I am, and looking for a meal, considerably less so. Dogs can be either loyal friends and companions or vicious pack animals. Yes, there are animals that are docile by nature, but how often is it that they are only that way because Humanity has breed them to be so?

Then there is the behavior of Vegetarians/Vegans that argues against them. I have not, to my knowledge, ever met a Vegetarian that did not grow plants and converse with them while they were growing, encouraging them to grow and be strong and to take joy in the Earth and the Sun and the rain. Then kill them and eat them. I note that the personification of vegetable life did not spare it the knife. Or fork.

There’s another argument for Veganism that is a bit more difficult to dismiss, and I have heard it stated like this: “It is immoral to cause any living creature avoidable harm.” That’s a good point, but I have only ever heard that statement made an absolute, and entirely without any argument in support. It is as if the argument itself were of such obvious moral superiority that no counter was possible. Against such arguments I have to ask, “Why?

“Why is it wrong? You seem to think it so obviously true that it requires no supporting argument, but I do not accept that it is so and I am waiting to be convinced.” The people I have known who would make such an argument have seldom (actually “never” thus far) thought that far in advance.

The question of need often comes up. “We don’t need to eat meat since we are no longer a cave-man society and no longer do cave-man things” is how this argument usually runs. I have to give a bit on this point; certainly most of society doesn’t require meat protein as much as our ancestors did. But there the argument sputters; as it happens, the worse off you are, the worse your diet is likely to be. Often, the poor don’t get enough protein. It is a sad irony that the poorer you are, the more you are likely to need to eat more protein and the less likely you are to be able to afford it.

Do I need to remind you that meat is an excellent source of protein?

It comes down to this: All that lives feeds on death. Any argument against a carnivorous lifestyle requires that you value some life forms above others. The inherent elitism and Chauvinism of such an argument belies any of the “moral” arguments that I have ever heard produced in defense of the superiority of either Vegetarianism or Veganism.

Admittedly, now that I have made the above argument there is one counter-argument that I cannot ignore: My point of view requires that I devalue all life to an equal degree. Well, true, but I might say that I value all life to an equal degree (which would be saying that it’s a matter of perspective); but as it happens I don’t make that case.

I consider the argument well reasoned, but that does not mean that I accept its moral superiority. It boils down to an argument of your values vs. my values, and that’s an argument that no one can win.

This is precisely the sort of value-based judgment that each individual must make for him/herself and I am against imposing my own values on anyone else. In short, I cannot command your values and you cannot command mine. We can talk about them, certainly, indeed that’s what I’m doing now, but I recognize that I am not going to convince you that I am right.

The sad fact is that, in the argument that started me on this, my animal-loving acquaintance never understood how I could be so unwilling to alter my behavior or my thinking to be in agreement with his obviously morally superior argument. I get a lot of that.

I realize that none of my arguments will mollify my radically Vegan, animal-rights-activist detractor. In the end, to this person I can only say:

If it doesn’t offend your Vegan sensibilities, bite me.

The Blues Viking
The opinions here expressed are mine and if you don’t like them you can get your own damn blog.

Yet another post about guns...

Yes, this is another post about gun control.  It may not be a “hot” issue right now, but that doesn’t seem to keep me out of arguments on the subject. These thoughts came from one such.

I never learn my lesson. Though I know that there is no subject as contentious, as able to land me in hot water or possibly cost me dearly-held friendships, I keep returning to this debate. Probably because it's so very far from being settled.

The Great Gun Control Debate continues, as it has for years, with “gun rights” supporters and “reasonable restriction” supporters using the same old arguments to achieve the same results…nothing changes much.

One such argument (that I am tired of hearing) is this:

“Guns don’t kill people, people kill people.”

I even agree with that argument, but just so far. Certainly, a gun is but a tool, neither good nor evil in or of itself; but it is a tool capable of being used either for good or evil as directed by the intent of the wielder.

What we have to realize is that, as a tool, the purpose of a gun is to kill. Hunting is killing; self-defense is at least the threat of killing. Any other purpose would be like using a fork or a spoon as a knife; somewhat adequate if you’ve nothing else but inferior to something made for the purpose. Face it: Killing is what a guns do.

It could also be argued, thought it’s not an argument that I would like to make, that killing is itself neither good nor evil; it derives such an attribute from the intent or purpose behind it as well as from its results. Whether or not such an argument is valid, I don’t think I like that much moral ambiguity served up with my philosophy.

And that, in a nutshell, is my problem with “gun rights” arguments that follow this reasoning…their moral ambiguity.

Until and unless you can convince me that you will know the heart of every person who would carry a gun, and convince me that they will do so without evil intent, I have to believe that reasonable restrictions (such as background checks, waiting periods and certain restrictions on ownership) are necessary.

The Blues Viking
The thoughts expressed here are mine and if you don't like them you can get your own damn blog.

Brace yourselves...democracy is coming.

I expect nothing substantive to change with this election. That doesn't mean you shouldn't get off your butt and vote.

Followers of this blog (few though they are) will have noted a pattern to my posting in the past: I post infrequently until a national election comes around, then I seem to rediscover how to type and my output goes up dramatically. Until a month or two after the election, that is, when I fall back into the role of the occasional blogger.

This time it's a bit different.

I haven't been blogging much about political issues, or candidates, or the elections themselves, and for what I think is a good reason: I do not expect anything to really change.

Oh, there will be changes, certainly, perhaps even big ones. There is every possibility that the Republicans will take control of the Senate, and though I'm not entirely convinced this will happen most other political hacks seem to think it likely. Anyway, if you're a gambler, that appears to be the way to bet.

But even if it does happen, I don't think it will make much difference. Not at the national level, anyway. Even if the Republicans take the Senate, they are very unlikely to attain the magical two-thirds majority that they'll need to stop Democratic filibusters, putting the Republicans in the same place that the Democrats have been in for years.

Of course, the Republicans could always use the so-called "nuclear option," a change in the rules of the Senate that the Democratic leadership was too chicken-shit to use themselves this last session and thus allowed unending Senatorial gridlock. If the Republicans were themselves to use this option, it would be the best thing they could do for this country...but I don't see it happening, and for the same reasons that the Democrats never used it. The Democrats didn't want to lose the ability to filibuster when they were in the minority, as they eventually would be, as the Republicans are now and eventually will be again. No one wants to lose the power of "minority rule" if they're in the minority, or expect to be.

Then there's the semi-mythical "veto proof" two-thirds majority of both houses...and the Republicans, even if they make great strides in both the House and Senate, are highly unlikely to achieve this. The President, who will veto any legislation he strongly disagrees with, will not have to suffer the embarrassment of having his vetoes overridden.

So the President will continue to ask for legislation that won't get through Congress, and Congress will send legislation to the President that he will veto and Congress will be unable to override said vetoes, and we'll have the same situation that we've had for years...nothing getting done.

In the midst of all this cynicism, perhaps this is an odd time to cajole you all to get off your butts and vote.

There are several important parts to American democracy. Congress is one, The People (that's us, gang) are another. I don't expect that I'll get much argument if I say that Congress is broken, that it's just not working properly. This makes it all the more important that our part of the democracy, We The People as it were, work that much harder. I keep saying that democracy works better if we all participate, and I do hope that someone is listening, and that's all the more important if our "leaders" in Congress aren't doing their jobs. Which they aren't.

There are forces out there trying to limit your access to democracy. Don't let them. Vote. No matter how hard they make it for you, vote. If they try to say you can't, insist. Get downright noisy if you have to. Don't let anyone try to limit your ability to vote.

Whatever your politics, whatever your party, whatever your stance, vote. Don't let anyone tell you you can't, or won't, or shouldn't. Vote.

If they try to marginalize you, make them notice you. Vote. If they try to silence you, make yourself heard. Vote. If they try to ignore you, get in their way and make them pay attention. Vote.

Just vote, OK?

The Blues Viking

The opinions expressed here are mine and if you don't like them you can get your own damn blog.

Faith, Hope, and Charity

Some further musings on the nature of Atheism. Mine, anyway.

No one ever hated because God told them to hate, no mater what such people may say. No one ever killed, maimed, or tortured because any supernatural being—real or imagined—commanded it, no matter how often you hear that claim. There is no act of bigotry, no act of unspeakable violence, no act of intolerable cruelty that did not happen because the person wielding the weapons (or commanding those who did so) wanted it to happen.

These things happen because human beings make them happen, and because other human beings do not object to them happening. Or do not object strongly enough.

I am not saying this because I don’t believe in supernatural beings (though, in fact, I don’t), I am saying this because I do not believe in blaming some unseen entity, real or imagined, for actions of people, even actions that no truly moral or ethical person would ever condone.

But by the same reasoning, neither can we credit the gods (or whatever) with the products of our better natures. It may be (I hope) that the urge to benefit all is as strong as the urge to exploit, the urge to help as strong as the urge to harm, the urge to create as strong as the urge to destroy.

Though the evidence for our better natures being as strong as our more base passions is scant, I find myself perpetually hoping that it is so, believing against any evidence to the contrary that it may indeed be true. Is that belief unreasonable? I am not the one to say.

I believe in our better natures because I see evidence of them, even though I do not see enough. I see that we can be better than a society founded on greed has shaped us to be. I see that there are people who will sacrifice greatly, even to their very lives, to make this world a better place. Far fewer than I’d like, fewer than we need, but they’re there. And I hope, against the preponderance of evidence, that a better world can be made if only we would pay heed to our better selves.

So tell me again how Atheists have no faith.

The Blues Viking
The opinions expressed here are mine and if you don’t like them you can get your own damn blog.

Stepping through the gateway

The arguments against the legalization of marijuana are basically the same ones used in 1970. They’re wearing a bit thin.

Whenever the question of legalization of Marijuana is discussed, someone will always bring out the argument that marijuana is a “gateway drug;” that is, according to Google, “a habit-forming drug that, while not itself addictive, may lead to the use of other addictive drugs.”

There’s a problem with this. Several, actually.

The idea of a “gateway drug” starts to fall apart when you realize that virtually all people who started using marijuana at a young age first used, or abused, alcohol and cigarettes. Notice that I did not say, “alcohol OR cigarettes,” since in every case I am aware of the “stoner” has first used them both.

The argument against this point always (in my experience) begins, “But alcohol and cigarettes are legal!” and starts to fall apart immediately. Frankly, I cannot find any logical support for this argument. If abuse of substance A leads to abuse of substance B, what the hell does it matter if substance A is legal or not?

I suppose that the underlying premise to the “gateway” argument is that legalizing marijuana will lead to more marijuana use, and thus to more abuse of harder, more destructive and less legal drugs through this “gateway.” But if you’re going to argue that everyone on heroin started with grass, then you have to face the argument that everyone on heroin started with eating food or drinking water or breathing air. Ask people to define the difference and marijuana opponents always seem to fall back of the old legality argument, willfully ignorant of its holes.

You could argue that grass is, itself, a destructive substance (the science of this is a matter of some debate), but are you also going to argue that alcohol and tobacco aren’t? Didn’t think so.

One other point re the “legality” argument; in every case I’m aware of, people who abuse alcohol and tobacco started doing so at an age when the use of either was illegal for them whether they then moved up to “harder drugs” or not. So that kind of knocks your “…but they’re legal!” argument on its ear.

It is also argued that the nature of the drug itself increases the propensity to abuse other drugs. Again, my counter to ask you how alcohol, with its powerful and potentially lethal intoxicating properties, doesn’t do the same. And we’re back to your legality/illegality argument again.

Another argument is that “peer pressure” pushes people into the use of harder drugs, and that legalization of marijuana will only make this worse. But I have never seen that “peer pressure” in any way respected such legalities. Beyond that. I have to plead that I am getting old and therefore am out of touch with the effects of peer pressure; I suspect that they aren’t as prominent as they once were, but I am to far out of it to judge properly. In any case, to me the “peer pressure” argument seems, at best, weak; at worst, it’s silly.

I haven’t smoked grass for at least thirty years. I was never a serious drinker and only smoked an occasional pipe or cigar, and I gave it all up when my heart became an issue. That was a long time ago. In my case, the use of alcohol or tobacco might have lead to the use of grass (though I doubt it) but the use of grass certainly never lead to the use of anything harder. Because of this, it’s difficult to sell me on the whole “gateway” thing.

I don’t really have a dog in this fight. But I do have opinions, informed ones, and the right to express them. I have just done so.

The Blues Viking

The opinions here expressed are mine and if you don’t like them you can get your own damn blog.

Excellent information, fully referenced, regarding the “gateway theory” and more:

http://www.drugwarfacts.org/cms/Gateway_Theory#sthash.q7DG2xUG.dpbs

Things Forever Lost

A word or two about grief.

I'm not functioning too highly today. My father died the day before yesterday and I heard about it yesterday, and "Facebooking" or blogging aren't high priorities for me right now. But when things like this happen I do tend to write about them, as much to examine as to express my feelings. Perhaps more so. So this...

I’m not really here, not really participating in my on-line life; I just want to post a couple of things to Facebook and then get on with my grief. Not so much grief for my father…he had thoroughly excised me from his life to the point where I now feel that excessive grief on my part would be an unwelcome intrusion. More grief for what might have been, certainly: I had entertained a fantasy in which he finally came to know the person I was (I think I knew him well enough, though) but that will never happen now and I’m really not ready to grieve over that. No, I have an entirely different grief now.

This morning I got up around 8:00 AM and fed the cat. This is not an easy thing, because he hadn’t been eating well lately, but this morning he ate some canned chicken (white meat) and drank some beef broth, and I saw him drinking his water. He meowed and purred for me, which he hadn’t done in a while. Over all, he seemed better than he had for the last few days and I was happy enough with his condition that I wasn’t concerned by having to spend a few hours in town getting the new truck insured and licensed.

I stopped to pick up insulin and blood test strips, as I had been out for a few days, and stopped on the way home to make an appointment for my cat with the veterinarian. (You can do all these things when you have wheels.) I was able to get him an appointment for today, so I rushed home to pick up my cat.

All too late. My cat had died, I would guess about an hour after I left the house this morning.

So why am I grieving so deeply over a cat and not so much for my father?

I think that each person is only capable of grieving for themselves. I think that grief comes from how we ourselves feel about who or what we’ve lost, and from how we related to that thing or person. Or pet.

I loved my cat. I loved how he’d snuggle up to me on chilly nights, how he’d sleep on my shoulder (and he wasn’t a small cat by any means), how he used to like to take a walk outside with me (even though in recent years I couldn’t manage more than a walk around the house), and a thousand quirks and habits that together made an animal that I truly felt was my friend.

I loved my father. But I never liked him much. We never agreed, never got along, never saw eye-to-eye. For fifty years I silently bore his wrath, his displeasure, his contumely, and in time I came to believe that such was my role in the family, and that I deserved no better. To this day I can hear him telling me how useless I was, and me a boy of twelve or so believing himself unfit for the kind of rewarding life that others seemed to claim as a right. But I loved my father. It has never occurred to me to ask why…I loved my father and that’s an end of it.

My cat was never judgmental, never abusive, never used me as an excuse for his own shortcomings. My father did all of these.

It would be very wrong for me to say that I do not grieve for my father, that I do not mourn his passing. Mostly, I mourn for the opportunities that both of us lost, the gone opportunities to finally share experiences as father and son, if not as friends. But when I mourn for my cat, as I have mourned for other lost pets over the years, I mourn for the loss of what we shared. This also applies to the loss of my brother, and my mother, and all of the other people (and pets) who have mattered to me but who have passed.

One last thing. My father, wracked by cancer and in pain from other conditions, choose to end his own life. I suppose he had every right to make that choice for himself, but he also made a choice for me; he chose to deny me even the possibility of reconciliation. I’m not saying that he didn’t have every right to make that choice, but I could wish that he had considered me at the end, even just a little.

Michael Starke Rosecrans,

the eldest son of William Starke Rosecrans

"...but that's not the point. The point is..."

Most of this has nothing whatsoever to do with the point I am trying to make.

I’m beginning to think that it’s pointless to oppose what our government says or does, since it grows more and more apparent that Government exists just to be so opposed, keeping us from rebelling against those who really control our destinies, namely the corporate interests that “our” government serves.

In my darker moments, I feel that “Corporate America” is the real America and that “the land of the free and the home of the brave” is a pleasant fiction maintained to keep us from directly opposing those who really pull the strings.

I know, this sounds highly cynical; in fact I hope it’s too cynical. Because a government that is totally subservient to Corporate America is a government that we the people cannot truly influence, against which we the people contend in vain. If America is truly run from the board room, where few of us have any voice, any advocate, then the government that we see is just smoke and mirrors and our “elected representatives” have no real power to do our will, even if they wanted to.

But I don’t always see America so darkly; sometimes I’m downright optimistic. Sometimes I believe that we can still make a difference in the world, that we can make enough of a change through the democratic process to keep government out of the hands of those we have not elected.

But is there still such an America, really? And if there is, then for how much longer? And if not, what can we do about it?

All of which has absolutely nothing to do with the point I am trying to make.

You see, whenever I write something like this someone usually criticizes me for asking such questions without at least suggesting answers. But I am not so vain as to believe that my answers are any better than yours, nor do I think you unable to find your own if you but look.

You don’t need my answers. We all need answers, but not necessarily mine. I am not Oz the Great and Powerful, nor am I the All-Seeing Oracle of Norvell. It seems to me that the more people we have looking for answers, the more people we have asking questions, the more people we have out there trying new ideas, the more people we have willing to fail, the greater our chance of success; the greater our chance of finding our way forward through all that would hold us back.

My point is this: To find your own answers, you have to look.

So look.

The Blues Viking

The opinions expressed here are mine and if you don’t like them you can get your own damn blog.

How to Rate Friends and Marginalize People

It took me a long time to figure out that the secret to Facebook happiness was not to offend easily. And I don't...but sometimes you just have to respond to nonsense.

Someone posted this meme yesterday. Not overly clever, and not overly interesting visually, but it expressed a sentiment that I’ve seen a lot of on Facebook. I get the point…but that point doesn’t matter.

Anyway, here's the meme:

As one of those dreaded freeloaders (I haven't been able to work for a while, and live off a miniscule Social Security Disability allowance) I took no offense at this, though I certainly could have. My current income is so phenomenally low that I fall below the IRS's you-can't-afford-to-pay-us-anything threshold. To be blunt, by this person's perspective I am (as this meme implies) of less value than a taxpayer. His/her point of view appears to be that those like me ("freeloaders" as he/she labels us) are of less value than "taxpayers" (which, I assume, would include the Koch Brothers, who probably pay less taxes than his/her family).

(Have I over-done the parentheses yet?)

I mention all of this to let you all know where I'm coming from, because I think that might be important in light if what I'm about to say. You see, whoever made this meme had a point to make, and certainly had every right to make it, but there's a far more iomportant point that they have entirely missed.

The real point, the point that this person doesn't get and probably wouldn't agree with, is that everyone matters, the rich no less than the poor, the hale no less than the infirm, the productive no less than the lazy. And no more than, either. If we start thinking that people can be rated according to their value to society, we’ve started down a very dark road that winds through some very dark places on its way to something nightmarish.

Euthanasia is on that road. So are death camps. So is ethnic cleansing. I’m not saying that they’re just around the corner, far from it. Far from where we are now (at least I hope so).  But we don’t have to walk down that road at all. We can value people for who and what they are, rather than for their arbitrary worth to society.

I cannot help but think that the person who made this railed against Obama’s “death panels” (which never actually existed, but never mind). I do not know that, of course, but to me it seems likely. In any case, the meme they produced is ample evidence that they themselves (them self?) are thinking along those same lines.

You see, this meme appears to foster the belief that people can be rated according to their value to society. And I'm not saying that they can't...I am saying that they shouldn't be.

(And I know that it’s just a matter of time until some individual posts some lame-ass Stairway to Heaven Led Zeppelin quote in response, because it's sooooo obvious, but I thought that since I am obviously the King of Lame that I’d go first: “Yes there are two paths you can go by, but in the long run / there’s still time to change the road you’re on.”)

The Blues Viking

The thoughts expressed here are mine and if you don't like them you can get your own damn blog.

Wound Care

Health care in the US was an open, festering wound that Obamacare has done little more than spray with Bactine. But for all its flaws…

Obamacare is flawed. Not as flawed as the health care system it replaced, but flawed nonetheless.

Five and a half years ago, just before the 2008 election, I wrote this in a blog post:

“How well I remember the early days of the Clinton administration, when Bill Clinton tried to make good on his campaign promises to reform health care. He placed his wife Hillary in charge of the operation and she tried, oh how she tried, but in her efforts to change a fundamental way Washington worked she found that there was far too much Washington to change. The Clinton health care effort met so much resistance in congress that it was abandoned and never saw the light of day. And we still don’t have proper health care.” (Days of Future Past, November 2, 2008)

And the years passed. Now we have another election under our belts, but we still don’t have what I would call proper health care. The fact is that for all that the Right likes to call Obama a Socialist, he’s anything but a Socialist. I know this because I used to be a Socialist (I got better) and where health care is concerned I suppose I still am.

My main complaint regarding “Obamacare” (or the "Affordable Care Act" if you prefer) is that it keeps control of health care in the hands of the insurance industry, who screwed it up in the first place. Never mind that “Big Insurance” has fought Obama on this. I honestly can’t understand the insurance industry for that; certainly, they now have to cover pre-existing conditions and they can no longer sell “junk” policies to everyone, but Obamacare has guaranteed their control over health care for at least a decade into the future, probably two.

Health care in the US was an open, festering wound that Obamacare has done little more than spray with Bactine.

Like I said before, I’m still something of a Socialist on this issue. But let’s leave my own desire for a proper single-payer system out of the discussion for the time being.

Yes, there are problems with Obamacare, it doesn’t work as well as it should in several areas, but I still think it’s better than what we had before. It has problems.The problem with the problems is that the Right has such a problem with Obamacare that they’re unwilling to offer any real solutions to these problems, other than to repeal the whole damn thing. They won’t even try to address Obamacare’s remaining issues, which are far from insurmountable if only Congress would work together to find a way to make it workable.

It bothers me that where Obamacare doesn’t work, the Republican-controlled House of Representatives can’t see past their hatred for Obamacare (or just their hatred for Obama) to try to make it work. Republicans seem to like to say that America already had the best health care in the world, but while it may look that way from the top it certainly doesn’t look that way from the bottom, the view most of us have of it. That “best in the world” assertion is impossible to support.

There are/were issues that desperately need/needed to be addressed, and Obamacare at least addresses/addressed them. Ignoring them won’t make them go away. I haven’t heard anything from the Republican side that is workable, or that rises much above the level of a vague promise that they’ll come up with something (they promise!) but before they do we must repeal the law that exists. For that matter, the Democrats don’t appear to be too keen on improving the system we have, either (but at least they’re not saying that the whole thing needs to be scrapped and replaced with political vaporware).

I really feel that the best way for the nation to go is toward a single-payer health care system, what truly would amount to socalized medicine, but you’d never get that through Congress and an electorate that sees anything “Socialist” as evil even if they don’t understand the word. I really believe that what American health care needs is to get control of it right out of the hands of the insurance companies. But I am enough of a realist to admit that Obamacare, with its faults, is close to being the best system we’re likely to get.

The Blues Viking

The thoughts expressed here are mine and if you don’t like them you can get your own damn blog.

Regarding Tom Paine

This is not intended to be a general discussion about Thomas Paine. Far from it. But there’s something about Paine that I would like to talk about.

Thomas Paine has been called “…a corsetmaker by trade, a journalist by profession, and a propagandist by inclination” (Saul Padover). His being a corsetmaker was appropriate; When the American Revolution threatened to come apart at the seams, Paine’s pamphlets (Common Sense and The American Crisis) kept the cause from unraveling. John Adams said, "Without the pen of the author of Common Sense, the sword of Washington would have been raised in vain."

It should be remembered that, by the time of his death, he wasn't remembered. Some of his later writings had attacked Christianity, and many people never forgave him for that. He had been a supporter of the French Revolution, but that revolution had become too radical for him. He had been an early supporter of Napoleon, but Napoleon had become to dictatorial for him. This is a common theme in Paine's later life; he even accused Washington of conspiring against him.

One widely reprinted obituary said this of Thomas Paine: "He lived long, did some good and much harm." I can't agree with that; his anti-religious stance and his revolutionary fervor may have fallen out of favor, but he remained true to his beliefs and I can find little harm in anything he did.

Pundits are forever at the whim of fashion. One who is praised for his insight one day might be reviled for those same opinions the next. Nothing goes out-of-favor easier than radical politics, especially when yesterday's radicals become today's traditionalists. The pundit who stands by his opinions regardless of the changing winds of political fortune should be admired, but seldom is.

But let's get back to Paine's work during the American Revolution, to his American pamphlets (Common Sense and The American Crisis) The thing to remember about Thomas Paine is that his intent with these works was never to inform, to educate, or to debate. His single purpose was to enflame. He had a gift of speaking in sound-bites, of reducing complex matters to easily quotable cleaver-sounding Thought McNuggets.

Don’t get me wrong; I admire Tom Paine and his writing. His work kept the American Revolution alive when its future looked darkest. As to his being highly quotable, I often quote him myself. But he wasn’t a Jefferson, a Hamilton or a Washington; he wasn’t a leader or a great political theorist (some authorities will disagree with me on that one). He was a rabble-rouser. But he was a rabble-rouser at just the time when the cause of rebellion most needed a rabble-rouser.

Tom Paine was more of a Rachel Maddow or a Rush Limbaugh, an advocate for a cause rather than the father of one. It would be wrong to credit him with originating the great thoughts of his day, but it has to be said that he was better at expressing those thoughts than nearly anyone else. Being wise wasn’t his genius…being clever was.

We need to remember Thomas Paine, his passion and his fate, when we consider the pundits of our own time. We need to consider which ones are willing to alter their opinions as fashion changes, and which ones will stand by their opinions when those opinions, inevitably, cease to move the public to action.

And we need to consider the value of what is said when our favorite pundits, even a less-than-praiseworthy one like myself, climb up on their soapboxes to offer their opinions phrased in easily digestible sound-bites.

Like that.

The Blues Viking
The opinions expressed here are my own and if you don't like them you can get your own damn blog.


Common Sense (pdf)

The American Crisis (pdf)

Thomas Paine on Wikipedia

Governor Christie, revisited

Back in 2012, I thought Chris Christie had shot himself in the political foot. He hadn't, as it turned out, but his aim has improved since then.

Back in 2012, just before the election, I published an article that both condemned New Jersey governor Chris Christie for his campaign-related dishonesty and praised him for setting his pre-election electioneering aside in the wake of the devastation of Hurricane Sandy. (My least favorite Republican. And my favorite. Same guy., November 3, 2012.) I still stand behind both of these opinions about Christie; in his efforts to get Mitt Romney elected, he showed a flagrant disregard for reality and truth, but when Sandy hit he all of a sudden became what he was elected to be, the Governor of New Jersey, and would work with Barack Obama if that was what was in the best interest of the people of New Jersey. Electioneering be damned.

This was admirable behavior from Christie, and he deserved praise for it. (Still does, in fact.) But his recent troubles over the George Washington Bridge fiasco show a return to the disingenuousness of the past. If, indeed, it was ever really gone.

Now, I could write a lengthy history of the GWB lane closures (in fact, I just did, and deleted the lot) but that would only be of value to someone who has been living in a cave without TV or perhaps watching Fox news. (There's a good article on Wikipedia about the scandal, and if you need background I suggest that you read it.) My point here is that the bridge scandal has done nothing to alter my original opinion of Christie, that he was a disingenuous clown, or my opinion that after Hurricane Sandy he acted in a way that could almost redeem him in my eyes. But his behavior since has only reinforced my original views; in fact, said behavior has set them in concrete.

But in going over my previous article, one point needs clarification. I was writing about how Christie had apparently shot himself in the foot with regard to his future ambitions for higher office, and in that I was quite wrong; Christie was the early frontrunner for the GOP nomination in 2016, as much as a lead this far in advance of the election means anything (it doesn't mean much). But with regard to what I wrote at the time, my meaning might have been a bit murky. I wrote:

"Christie has shown little desire for either the Presidency or the Vice Presidency. He seems to have no strong ambitions beyond being the governor of New Jersey."

I was referring to the lack of regard he had apparently shown by choosing his elected role as New Jersey Governor rather than his more recent position as Mitt Romney's campaign surrogate, but I don't think I made that clear.

But in truth, that hardly matters now. Regardless of how much of the currently-thrown muck sticks to Chris Christie, I think his chances of securing the Republican nomination in 2016, while never all that good, are now about nill.

The quote from Christie that I used to close that article in 2012 still works, only now it drips with irony:

"I don't give a damn about Election Day. Let the politicians who are on the ballot worry about Election Day. It's not my problem."

No, Governor, it's not. And I don't think it ever will be.

The Blues Viking
The opinions here expressed are mine and if you don't like them you can get your own damn blog. 

"When I fight Authority..."

The question isn't so much whether I have any respect for authority, but rather to what degree does authority deserve respect.

Sometimes I write things and then forget all about them, and then I either lose them entirely or put them where I happen to run across them at a later date. I found this on my computer this evening, and decided to clean it up a bit and post it. It may be a bit rambling, but I obviously spent most of an evening writing it and I don't feel like simply discarding it. So here it is.

I have recently been accused of a degree of irreverence in my attitude toward authority. I plead guilty.

This accusation has prompted me to examine the concept of authority. First, I should note that the word “authority” refers both to both the people who wield power and the power they wield. In this essay I’m talking about both. I’m talking about the people who have (or think they have) authority as well as the supposed power such people may wield (or think they wield); though more the former, since we live in a world where such power is meaningless without a person to wield it. (If you fear that the machines will one day rise and take this power away from us then stop reading right now and go and watch a Terminator movie marathon.)

Also, I need to distinguish between “authority” (the sort of thing your boss has over you, or your teacher, or a cop, or a judge) and “Authority” (the sort held by an indifferent, impersonal, ill-defined Government that, it theory, derives its powers from the governed but which in actuality claims and enforces powers for itself that no one ever asked us about).

I have heard it argued that the acceptance of authority, to one degree or another, is a necessary evil. Myself, I have never seen it as such, and I don’t find it particularly necessary or necessarily evil. But the fact is that we live in a society that requires each of us to accept some degree of authority over our persons, either in the person of a police officer or in the moral strength of religious leaders or in the content of a constitution or in the grip of the shadowy and poorly restrained State. None of these are necessarily bad or evil, in fact mostly they are far from evil, but they all have a potential to be evil.

The danger in all this acceptance of authority, a danger that always looms over us, is that surrendering authority over ourselves to others so often leads us to deny responsibility for our own actions, or worse to accept the will of Authority as our own. (And I am now speaking of Authority as an entity in and of itself; note the capital-A.)

But to get back to the charge against me: Yes, I have an irreverent attitude toward authority, and I mean either authority or Authority. It can be respected when it merits respect, deferred to when it merits deference, obeyed when it merits obedience, but I cannot see that it ever merits reverence and I have never revered it.

You may argue with my attitude, or with my definitions: You may, for example, think that the authority of a cop or a judge should be spelled with a capital-A, or that the authority of the clergy deserves reverence. Me, I don’t see the law as an agent of distant and impersonal Authority and I have reverence for no religious beliefs, especially not my own, so the agents of religion get no reverence from me. I am speaking about my opinions, and if you want someone else’s opinions go and read a different blog.

Yes, I am irreverent, and I make no apologies for that. Actually, I’m rather proud of it.

The Blues Viking

The thoughts expressed here are mine and if you don't like them you can get your own damn blog.

Considering the source

Who someone is is at least as important as what they say.

Sometimes a quote requires a bit more from me than a meme.

I recently ran across this, from British environmentalist and activist George Monbiot:

“The problem with gross domestic product is the gross bit. There are no deductions involved: all economic activity is accounted as if it were of positive value. Social harm is added to, not subtracted from, social good. A train crash which generates £1bn worth of track repairs, medical bills and funeral costs is deemed by this measure as beneficial as an uninterrupted service which generates £1bn in ticket sales.”

I like (and agree) with this quote. Frankly, that quote says something important and worth repeating (in my not-very-humble opinion). But the reason it’s not appearing in a meme on my Facebook timeline is that in researching the source (of whom I admit that I had not previously heard), I turned up a couple of things I also thought worthy of note. Basically (and I do realize that I am over-using parenthesis), I found out that he’s a bit of a slime-ball.

In the interest of fairness, it must be noted that George Monbiot was involved in an effort to defame Alistair McAlpine, Lord McAlpine of West Green, a prominent conservative and former advisor to Margaret Thatcher, with false allegations of child abuse. These false allegations resulted in court decisions against both the BBC and ITV with the cash awarded being donated to charity by Lord McAlpine, who also dropped his suit against Monbiot in exchange for Monbiot donating his time to three charities. Monbiot described this action by Lord McAlpine as “unprecedented.”

It should also be noted that Monbiot put his hypocrisy on tour when he bought a used diesel Renault and toured the US and Canada in it, campaigning on climate change.

While I agree with a lot of what Monbiot has said, and I support many of the same causes as he does, his blatant sleaziness and unrepentant douchebaggery makes him a less-than-desirable spokesman. And while I oppose much of what Baron McAlpine supports, it must be said that in most other regards he comes off much better than Monbiot.

I feel that it’s important for me to say that, to vocally repudiate much of what Monbiot is aside from the causes he represents, just as I feel it to be important that the Republicans and Conservatives speak against the more off-the-wall elements of their own movement. Frankly, I don’t hear enough of this sort of thing from either side.

Edited for spelling on 3/22/14, because I could no longer stand the errant "T" that changed hear to heart.

The Blues Viking

The thoughts expressed here are mine and if you don’t like them you can get your own damn blog.

Wikipedia on George Monbiot 

Wikipedia on Lord McAlpine 

How to destroy a society: Try to save it.

The problem with a pluralistic democracy is that no one wants the “pluralistic” part. And most of us are none too keen on the “democracy” part, either.

(Sometimes, I do amazingly stupid shit. This is one of those times. Apparently, I wrote this article back in January...and forgot to post it. I ran across it again while I was cleaning out some garbage on Google's Blogger. It was a bit too good to just delete, so here it is. Belatedly.)

Quoth Webster:

plu·ral·ism

1. a situation in which people of different social classes, religions, races, etc., are together in a society but continue to have their different traditions and interest
2. the belief that people of different social classes, religions, races, etc., should live together in a society
   
   Merriam-Webster (m-w.com)

In my continual scavenging for quotes, I ran across this gem from conservative pundit Mark Levin:

“We now have the liberal playbook and we know what they are doing, and we are using it against them. Unlike the Democrats though, we aren't out to destroy our society, we are out to save it.”

What utter hogwash. Does Levin actually believe that Democrats are deliberately seeking to destroy society, or worse to destroy America itself? Are we (Liberals, not merely card-carrying Democrats) actually so evil? (I mean, I try to be, but…)

What Levin does not appear to realize (or perhaps is deliberately ignoring) is that we are all trying to save society. We all want to leave the world a better place then we found it. We all want to make this a better, stronger, more durable society than we ourselves inherited.

Inevitably, people are going to disagree about the best way to accomplish this. That’s what a pluralistic democracy is for. That’s what compromise is for. We are never going to all agree on the best way to move forward; we have to trust that a solution reached through open debate and compromise, while unlikely to entirely satisfy everyone, is a better way to achieve our common goals. Not perfect, far from it, but better.

Here’s what makes Levin and his ilk dangerous. He (and they) refuse to acknowledge that their opposite numbers (the evil Liberals) are themselves trying to achieve those same goals. Refusing to acknowledge this lets the far right believe that only they can save society, and thus any extreme in the pursuit of that goal is permissible.

And let us not forget that there are Liberal extremists out there as well, those who simply can not (or will not) accept that there are Conservatives who are doing nothing more than trying to make a better society.

As a single society composed of differing ideas, we have but two options; either we move forward or we stand still (going backwards is hardly an option; almost never possible and often disastrous to attempt). Moving forward requires that we all work at it together. Singling out one group or the other and trying to lay the responsibility for society’s evils at their feet is counterproductive. Extremism is extremely counterproductive.

It comes down to this: Working together may not guarantee success, but failing to do so guarantees failure. The sooner we all recognize this, the sooner we can all move our society forward.

The Blues Viking

The thoughts expressed here are mine, and if you don’t like them you can get your own damn blog.

Imaginary conversation with a cat, early one frigid morning…

Meow?

Hey, meow?

C’mon, man, meow already!

Go ‘way, Kitty. I’m asleep.

Can I go outside?

Kitty, it’s freezing out there.

Can I just have a look?

You’re just going to stand there for five minutes while I 

shiver in the cold wind holding the door open, then decide 

you don’t want to go out after all. So no.

Please? I promise I’ll check very carefully before I go out, 

and if it’s too cold I’ll come right back in. Meow?

It’s ten below outside! You’d freeze. No, Kitty. I’m sorry.

You’re mean.

I know, Kitty. Please let me sleep now.

Well, will you feed me?

Not right now, OK? Please let me sleep.

Don’t hide under the blankets. You know that never works. 

I really want some food now.

Not now, Kitty.

Even if I sit on your shoulder?

I’m sorry. I need to sleep.

How ‘bout if I do that thing where I gently paw at you?

Please don’t do that.

With my claws out?

Stop that.

How about if I just walk around on your head?

STOP that!

Here come the claws…

Alright, alright! I’m up. I’m going to the kitchen. 

I’m getting your food.

Will you carry me?

Of course I will.

And give me some water, too?

Of course I will.

And while you’re carrying me you can babytalk to me. I 

like that.

“Good Kitty. You’re a good Kitty. Yes you are!”

And when I’m done eating can I come snuggle with you? 

I promise I’ll purr real loud; I know you like that…

Of course you can, Kitty.

Then can I go outside?

<sigh> We'll see, Kitty.

The Blues Viking

The thoughts expressed here are mine and if you don't like them you can get your own damn blog.

How Green Was My Prius

Electric cars have gone from being a drawing-board pipe dream to being in every major automobile manufacturer's inventory. They are popular, at least in part, because they are perceived as being better for the environment. They aren't; not yet, anyway. But if we weren't making and selling them now, perhaps they would never realize that potential.

Back in November of '08, part of an article I wrote dealt (briefly) with the Chevrolet EV-1, a fledgling electric car that worked well, was manufacturable, was practical, and was inexplicably killed by General Motors. (What color is you're lifejacket?, November 20, 2008.) It seemed then that the electric car was far off in the future. Not so far, as it happened; electric cars are now offered by every major car manufacturer. And people are buying them. It's time (well past time) to take another look at this subject.

Deceptive color, green.

Consider the battery. There are few endeavors as destructive to the environment as the production of electric batteries. Environmentalists will (justifiably) eschew the production of batteries for toys and CD players and flashlights and the like, while loudly championing electric cars as the saviors of the planet even though the batteries in them are far more environmentally destructive to produce than those in your flashlight. At the current time, an electric car is as environmentally destructive as the gas-guzzler it would replace.

This leads to the kind of math that I am terrified by: Just how many human deaths is it worth to save the planet? I am not sure that we can assign such values to things without resigning our humanity.

If you think that I am saying that we shouldn't be driving electric cars, I am definitely not saying that. The problems of the electric car, and the batteries that it relies upon, are indeed large but I do not think that they're insurmountable. But who's going to climb that mountain if improvements in these technologies aren't needed, now? It may, in fact, come to pass that things like electric cars will indeed be the saviors of us all, but only if we can find a way of producing their components and developing their technologies without killing ourselves. I am sure that such problems cannot be overcome without research, that getting such research done will require a market, and that market won't exist unless we are pushing products like electric cars that require such research to fulfill their potential.

This is the reality of capitalism...nothing ever gets done without there's a profit in it. We may decry the fact that our way of life is driven by the relentless pursuit of profit, we may even be striving mightily to change that (or maybe just blogging about it), but no matter how earnestly we may want it to be otherwise it is what it is. For now, anyway, and even if we can change that can we really hope to change it in time?

This should be a point that the conservatives are making, and loudly. It isn't.

We live in a time when the electric car is perceived as a "left wing" thing by the right, and this perception is fueled by Barack Obama's strong support of the concept. This is unfortunate, since whatever Obama supports is automatically denigrated in conservative dogma. This is in defiance of the marketplace, the deity at whose alter all conservatives sacrifice, because the electric car is succeeding in that marketplace. In their rush to demonize anything that Obama supports, they are willing to likewise demonize a technology that is, despite their efforts, succeeding. 

A quick Google search turned up some glowing rhetoric from manufactures (naturally) and the left (naturally) extolling the virtues of the electric car along with some vitriolic rhetoric from the right (naturally) warning that the evil electric car is economically and environmentally unsound. But while the noise from the manufactures (and the noise from the left) is ignoring the dire warnings from the right, the noise from the right is ignoring the very real economic and environmental necessity of doing this now if we're ever going to do it better in the future.

So go ahead and buy that Prius (or Volt or Leaf or whatever) and drive it without embarrassment (if you can) but don't fool yourself that you're doing anything for the environment. You aren't...not today, anyway. But maybe, just maybe, you're making it possible for something truly great to happen tomorrow.

The Blues Viking

The thoughts here expressed are mine and if you don't like them you can get your own damn blog.